“Then why is your pulse erratic.” His fingertips stroked the delicate blue-veined skin inside her wrists. “Why is your breathing so shallow?”
“You know why.” She watched him from under her eyelashes. “It’s this overwhelming attraction between us.”
He shook his head. “If that was all it was you wouldn’t be trying to back out, you’d be bright-eyed and eager. No, this is something else.” He scanned her face.
She could see that razor-sharp mind thinking. Would he guess the truth?
That she loved him?
“Are you worried that I still have you confused with your sister?”
“No.” Strangely that didn’t worry her at all.
Some of the tension went out of Angelo. “Good. I’m glad we’ve got that out the way because the two of you are really not alike at all. I knew you had changed. It simply never crossed my mind there were two of you. I thought you were one of a kind. Now, what are you afraid of?”
Gemma swallowed again. “I don’t want to be married to someone who-” She broke off.
“Who what?”
Who didn’t love her.
That was the simple truth of it. She’d been contemplating marrying one of the most desirable men on the planet. A man who didn’t love her. For the sake of her child.
She must be mad.
“Who what?” he prompted again.
“A man who a zillion other woman are going to find as a hot as I do,” she replied after a pause made it clear that he would remain silent until she answered.
“Ah-” he stroked her hand “-now it gets interesting. You’d only need to be concerned if those gazillion women interested me,” he said quietly.
She thought about what he’d said. Her stomach rolled over. Could he possibly mean…“So why wouldn’t you be interested in any of those zillions of woman?”
“Why did you really agree to marry me?”
There was a burning intensity in his question. Their eyes duelled, held. Indecisively, Gemma gazed into his turquoise depths.
“I’m scared,” she confessed.
“Of what?”
“That if I tell you, you’ll-” She broke off and shook her head. She couldn’t bear it if he laughed…or worse, looked at her with pity in his eyes.
“Would it help if I told you why I asked you to marry me?”
“Because of the baby?”
He drew a deep shuddering breath. “Not because of the baby. For me.” His grip tightened on her hands. He leaned closer. “After you left, it wasn’t the same. My life was empty. I need you to complete me. I love you.”
Her breath caught.
His eyes were bright, unguarded. The love shone from them. “The baby was an excuse, a way of getting what I really wanted. You.”
Gemma’s breath left her in an audible whoosh. Warmth filled her, her body softened, leaning into him. He felt warm and solid against her. Permanent. “I love you, too.”
“At last!” He yanked her into his arms. The kiss that landed on her mouth held a touch of desperation.
And she realised that Angelo had been nervous. He hadn’t been sure of her at all. “I was getting cold feet at the idea of being married to someone who didn’t love me.”
“And I have to admit I wasn’t thrilled at marrying someone who wanted me only for my body. Wench.” He sat up and grabbed her hand and slid the ring onto her finger. It fit perfectly.
Gemma giggled. “It could’ve been worse. I could’ve told you that I was marrying you for your money. To settle my credit-card debt.”
“I knew that wasn’t a factor.”
“How?”
“The offer of the contract to sing in Australia would have taken care of your debt.” He slanted her a look. “That’s a resort I’ve recently acquired. I wasn’t intending to let you get too far away. Once I got over the shock of your revelation that you weren’t Mandy…and the even bigger shock that I wanted you back. I had to make a plan to get you back.”
“I should’ve known!” Gemma laughed with joy. “I almost turned it down. Because I’d discovered I was pregnant. I wanted to work in New Zealand so I could be close to my parents. But the chance to get rid of that debt was too good.”
A kiss landed on the top of her head. “Now we’ll spend our honeymoon there and I’ll spend the four months I have you under contract overseeing the developments I have planned for those resorts.”
She cuddled closer. “And speaking of work. I still want to sing. But something Daphne said struck a chord with me. She’s talked about starting a foundation to educate young people about the dangers of drugs. I’d like to get involved with that.”
“Do anything you want. I will support your decision.”
No longer his way. But their way. Gemma smiled to herself. “I’d like to feel that someone like Mandy could be saved. Or someone like Daphne’s son, Chris.”
He hugged tightly to him. “You have my support, on one condition: we get married before the new year.”
She lifted her face to his, hooked her arm around the back of his head and pulled his mouth down to hers. “Deal!”
Angelo had one final surprise for Gemma. He flew her parents out to Strathmos for the wedding and watched her stunned delight as they walked into the penthouse to surprise her.
He put himself out to charm her parents. Two nights before the wedding the four of them had dinner in the Golden Fleece and afterwards they strolled down to the Apollo Club.
Later they shared a nightcap in the penthouse. By the time her parents were ready to call it a night, it was ten o’clock. After kissing her mother good-night and giving her father a hug and seeing them to the door, Gemma turned to Angelo with a gleam in her eyes that made his throat tighten and said, “I fancy a long, hot soak.”
They wallowed in the huge spa tub in his bathroom. Angelo lounged across from her, his damp hair had darkened to bronze but his eyes were as startling, as vivid, as ever.
“Tired?” Angelo’s tone was gentle.
She opened her eyes. His gaze held a tenderness she’d never seen before. “More like lazy. I feel like I never want to get out the water.”
He smiled. “Oh, I guarantee you’ll want to.”
Her heartbeat bumped up. Her skin prickled, every inch of her instantly awake and energized.
“Angelo-”
Under the water his hand slid over her belly. “Our baby.”
She smiled at him. “Our baby.”
His gaze very intent, he said, “I love you, Gemma. Only ever you.”
“I know,” she murmured. “And for me there will only ever be you.”
His eyes started to smoulder. “I believe you. I know you will never betray me.
“Come.” He pulled her over him and water washed around them both at the sudden movement.
Gemma became intensely aware of the supple strength of his chest against her back, the hard length of his erection against her buttocks, ready and waiting.
Her head fell back into the crook of his shoulder where it joined his jaw, uncaring that her hair would be soaked.
When his other hand came up to play with her nipple, locking her in the circle of his arms, Gemma made a frantic, keening noise in the back of her throat and bucked her hips.
Angelo laughed softly in her ear. “More?”
The sound she made was barely coherent. One of his hands left her breast, snaked downward and slipped between her thighs.
